A Lick of Amnesia
by Countess Millarca
Summary: On their way to save Gaara from Akatsuki, Sakura comes to a very disturbing realization regarding her, Itachi, and things that should have never happened.


**A/N: This is, umm, weird, terribly OOC, half in Sakura's POV, half in Itachi's POV, and ends with a lick of smut? Yes, that's about right. Do enjoy. ;D**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto. All rights belong to Kishimoto, Masashi.**

* * *

Sakura saw Kakashi's signal to stop before she saw the reason for it, the man waiting ahead, donned in the black and red cloak only an Akatsuki member wore.

"Uchiha, Itachi."

Naruto's slow whisper revealed the identity of the man, struck Sakura with the swiftness of a heart attack. Jaw and gaze hard-set, she took in the man responsible for both Sasuke's and Naruto's suffering.

"That person is…Uchiha…Itachi."

Even as Sakura uttered the words, she couldn't believe it – that they would meet him here, that _she_ could finally meet him.

"It's been a long time, Kakashi-san, Naruto-kun."

Itachi might have addressed them with his words, yet his eyes, those crimson-swirling eyes, were focused on Sakura with strange familiarity – and she _knew_ then. It took a few, long moments for memory to awaken – slow, painstakingly slow, the process. Reality twined with amnesia, impressions plaited in thick braids.

Sakura struggled to place sequence of events – the Naka Shrine, the Tsukuyomi. She had no name for what came after them, only heat, raw sensation. Self-willed, still throbbing, it twisted her mind towards notions she would rather never contemplate. If not for the intensity of his gaze, she might have made allowances, fatuous excuses for herself, for her weak will, but she wasn't granted such liberties. Itachi's eyes murmured the answers, unwound the runnels of time, kindled the coals of memory in doing so – only to bury them once more.

* * *

_A Month Earlier_

Sakura had spent two long years in the Hokage's private library, researching the horrid event known as the Uchiha Massacre and the annihilated clan itself. It had been trying and vexing and unpleasant – but not without results. Her findings had led her to one place – the Naka Shrine. Whatever secrets lay hidden within its inner dwellings were protected by the most intricate seals Sakura had ever encountered. Unweaving them had been another ordeal and, now that she was finally inside, more hardships awaited her. Therein stood a stone monument which contained valuable information – no doubt.

If only Sakura could decipher how to read it. Night after night, she read and guessed and scribbled. Futile. She had a vague hypothesis that someone who possessed the Sharingan could unveil its secrets with ease, but she didn't wish to involve Kakashi into this. It was her mission, her task, her promise to Naruto and herself.

Tonight, like every other night, she glared at the conspicuous monument, paced back and forth, aggravated, almost defeated, scrolls strewn in careless piles on the floor – but, unbeknownst to her, there _was_ a difference. Sakura _wasn't_ alone.

"You shouldn't have come to this place."

It took a fragment of a second for Sakura to realize that someone had spoken, that someone was there, concealed in the dark. The male voice was low, whispered deadly calm. A body detached itself from the shadows, walked into her vision, as she turned towards its direction, muscles clenching, chakra flowing, accumulating into her fists. Her pulse accelerated, thumped out a wild rhythm against her ribcage, when her eyes made sense of whom she was seeing.

_Sharingan… _Unmistakable. Blood-red irises, adorned with three distinctive commas, startling against his pale skin and his black hair. Not tall but not short either, he was undeniably an Uchiha, but this man wasn't Sasuke – he resembled him, slightly, yet not. His eyes were more slanted, his lashes more curled, his mien softer, quieter – but far more lethal. Not counting physical characteristics and similarities, Sakura only needed to glimpse at his Akatsuki cloak to identify him. _Then he's –_

"Uchiha…Itachi."

His name spilled from her lips in hushed undertones, too breathy. Her blood chilled as awareness wove its tendrils around her mind. Sakura didn't even have time to berate herself for her carelessness, her foolishness. He was a Sharingan user, her logic screamed at her to _stop _looking into his eyes, and yet…she couldn't. Sakura paid for her lapse in judgment, for her slow reflexes, as she knew she would.

No sooner had her head started to lower, panic-filled, hyper-aware, that she saw his Sharingan swirl, shape-shift, merge into three spiraling curves. The Naka Shrine morphed into a black and white spaciousness, devoid of life, of motion. There was only she, strapped on a wooden contraption that imitated a cross, limbs shackled by tight ropes, Uchiha Itachi, and the redness of his eyes – the sole color that remained. It made the lack of hue saturation, this anomaly of a world, all the more eerie.

_Genjutsu? _Sakura licked her dry lips, exhaled a long breath. Genjutsu could be countered. She only needed to stop the flow of chakra in her body then apply an even stronger power to disrupt the flow of the caster's chakra.

"It's useless. I can tell you're a genjutsu-type, but you can't dispel this one."

Itachi's voice washed over her, glissaded in languorous motions, reminded her of that which she should not have forgotten. Sakura raised her eyes to his level, pinned him with a hard stare. There was no longer a need to avoid the snare of his eyes.

"I remember now. You used this technique on Kakashi-sensei and Sasuke-kun once."

Itachi's countenance didn't change, not even a muscle twitch, but Sakura could tell she had made an impression. His next words, his slight nod, validated her assumption.

"You have good memory."

A noise vibrated in her throat, half-snort, half-chuckle. Sakura supposed she should consider herself privileged to get a compliment in this situation – compared to what was to come. But she had enough of nerve-racking circumvention, of useless delay. There were far more important things on the line.

"What will you do with me? If you were going to kill me, you would have done so already instead of this. Erase my motivation, perhaps? To make me stop sniffing around the Uchiha's past?"

Itachi surprised her with another compliment.

"Perceptive as well."

If she could, Sakura would have shrugged, yet her motions were limited to a curling of lips, wry, near mocking, though mostly at herself for getting caught in his genjutsu.

"It's simple logic. There's something buried in this place that you don't want people to know about – and I must be getting close to finding out what it is. You wouldn't have chanced infiltrating the village otherwise."

Itachi didn't correct her deduction which told her it was true – but he did move. It was minimal, a flutter of lashes, a tilt of his neck, as his eyes searched hers for something she couldn't perceive.

"Human nature isn't something anyone can change so easily. Even if I compelled you to abandon your quest for the time being, curiosity cannot be quenched. One day, you would begin your search anew. It's pointless to spare energy for such a thing."

Sakura couldn't help but nod, apprehensive, confused…and a bit amused. The fact that she was having a sedate discussion on the human mind with her soon-to-be tormentor was laughable – and utterly unpalatable.

"I see. Where does that leave us then?"

"I will purge this place from your memory. Even if by some chance you come close to finding it again, you'll feel an innate compulsion to stay away."

It wasn't his solution that left Sakura awe-struck but the lack of violence in it. Surely, Itachi wouldn't just brainwash her and be done with her. It couldn't be _that simple_ – and she told him as much, albeit quite derisively.

"How simple."

"Yet effective."

Itachi hadn't even paused in his retort. Perhaps…perhaps there wasn't more to it than merely that. Tentatively, carefully, she dared for hope, asked him for verification – this time, without derision in her voice.

"Is that it then?"

His silence was answer enough. Sakura exhaled a sigh of relief. Of course, she could be an idiot for taking the word of a wanted criminal, but Itachi seemed different in person than in reports, somehow. 'Cold-blooded' suited him fine with his apathetic demeanor but not 'blood-thirsty'. He was…polite, levelheaded – and he had tied her to a cross. So absorbed she was in her musings that she almost missed what he said next.

"Don't get too close to Sasuke. If you do, you will die."

It was out of context, quite unexpected, most peculiar. More disturbing than the warning was the fact that he had given it. Sakura studied his features more closely, the line of his mouth, the shape of his brows, looked for a trace of emotion – but he gave her nothing.

"Not only you don't want to kill me, but you're actively trying to keep me alive."

He neither confirmed nor denied it. Her brows knitted into a frown, a huff slipped past her lips.

"I don't understand."

"I don't suppose you can."

If Sakura hadn't been staring at him as intently as she had, she would have missed the slight stretch on the curve of his mouth – but she was quick enough to see it. If it had been anyone else _but_ Uchiha Itachi, Sakura would have thought that she was just being teased, complimented on her intelligence then insulted on it by the same person. But, perhaps, she _was_. A bark of laughter escaped her throat regardless and she dared treat him as she would anyone else.

"Now there's the famed Uchiha arrogance I know so well. I had almost forgotten how it felt like to be taunted by an Uchiha since Sasuke's been gone for so long."

That stretch on his mouth widened into an almost tight-lipped smile. Sakura was right – Itachi was messing with her for reasons unknown, inexplicable, and absurd. Nothing made sense in this monochromatic world.

"Even so, you miss him."

Sakura decided to surrender after his insightful remark. There was no point trying to decipher Itachi's motives for being…cordial. He probably acted in this manner because she wouldn't remember it come morning either way. This person had killed his entire family, joined a criminal organization, tortured Sasuke and Kakashi, hunted Naruto, and yet…Sakura couldn't find it in herself to loathe him. In the back of her mind, something held her back, murmured it was wrong, that there was more to him than met the eye.

"I wouldn't be trapped in a genjutsu with an S-class criminal if I didn't."

If Sakura hadn't misheard, a soft 'hmm' made its way past his lips, as if he was contemplating both Sakura and her answer.

"Why do you care so much? Sasuke has been nothing but distant to you."

Now, _this_, Sakura was most certainly not expecting. Out of all people, Itachi was the last person who should comment on her relationship – or lack thereof – with his younger brother. A scowl touched her forehead and she almost snapped at him but refrained at the last minute. Eyes thinned, lids lowered, she leveled him with both suspicion and anticipation.

"How would you know what Sasuke and I were like?"

The faint hums of amusement she had been sensing from him disappeared all at once, as if they were never there in the first place. When he answered, his voice betrayed heaviness, yet it was strangely light as well.

"Because I made him that way. Don't take it personally."

His overt bluntness, the condescendence in his tone, rankled for some reason. Still, Sakura refused to let him know that, smiled a feigned smile.

"Hmm…not personal, you say. Then why would _you_ care to know the answer to that?"

"You retain a bond with Sasuke."

Her brow rose, half-irritation, half-impatience.

"That doesn't answer my question."

There it was again, that stretching of lips, that almost smile.

"Call it mere curiosity. It's a human fault as I've said."

Sakura stared at him, unblinking, tested his sincerity, then decided to humor him.

"It started as a crush. It's different now, but I guess _you_ wouldn't understand."

Her mouth tilted in a half-smirk as she added the last part, indulging her urge to pay him back for his earlier teasing.

"Distance makes the heart grow fonder, is it?"

Sakura couldn't restrain the laughter that undulated in her lungs, buzzed in her throat, palpipated under her tongue. She let it all out, just relishing the moment. That _he _would talk of matters of the heart. More so with Sakura.

"Perhaps, perhaps not…"

Itachi didn't seem to care much for either her laughter or her cryptic reply from the way he retreated into silence once again. Sakura suppressed a sigh, eyes narrow, lips drawn into a tight line.

"You are being awfully talkative."

It was a well-targeted jibe, not the truth but not a lie either – they both knew that. His eyes spoke for himself, told Sakura what she had guessed.

_You won't remember anything after I'm gone._

Itachi didn't bother with words – _again_. But Sakura couldn't not talk. Why he hadn't simply erased her memories by now was a mystery in and of itself, one that she desperately needed to solve.

"Let me ask you something else then. Is there a point to this conversation? I won't remember you or your warning or anything spoken between us."

His lips spoke for himself, this time, but it was wordless. The wicked slant of his mouth was, blatantly, daring, too obvious for Sakura not to know what he meant.

_But _I_ will._

"You are not what I expected. Did you _really_ kill your clan?"

It was the wrong thing to say, Sakura realized this, but had no means of reversing it. She couldn't be certain of the reason, but Itachi's eyes liquefied with something dark, with promises of pain.

"No? This might change your mind then."

Chakra writhed and slithered and pulsed beneath her skin. Not her chakra. _His_. Fire in the veins – ice in the flesh – a change of skin. It coursed through bone marrow, sinewy tissue and muscle, tendons and joints, devastated all in its path. A mass of spasms and sweat. Sakura moaned, begged for something to end, something to begin.

Images swam in her mind, gruesome events, too real, too much. Blood, darker than red – rich with the scent of life, thick with the taste of murder – saturating her tongue, gliding down her throat, seething into her abdomen. Many people, many faces, all black-haired and black-eyed, all experiencing the same death. A flailing of limbs, strained, wild, never to last, over too soon, a blotch of carmine and gaping flesh on the ground.

The Uchiha Massacre. And Sasuke, little Sasuke…eyes impossibly wide, hurt and disbelief and rage, seeping into his pores, piercing through his small body. _Foolish, little brother…_ Then, an older version of him, plastered against a wall, blood trickling down his chin, being subjected to the same torment. _You're weak – why are you weak? _The last vision Sakura saw was of Kakashi, strapped onto the same wooden cross she was, his body covered in streams of white blood and slices of pain and blades of metal. Over and over and over.

When Itachi's power ebbed, withdrew from the pith of her cells, when he released her from this nightmare, Sakura was panting and gasping, respiration toiling in her lungs, horripilation crawling over her skin.

"What – you…"

The hue of his irises was unnatural, like melted blood, made redder in this black and white matrix, as he gazed down at her.

"Don't presume things. That, too, will get you killed."

Despite the tang of death still clinging to her skin, the slash of agony still cutting through her body, Sakura laughed, craned her neck to stare at him.

"I thought we had agreed you wouldn't kill me."

Her laughter echoed in the hollow space, hoarse, too dry, yet to Itachi's ears it was mellifluous, comely. Most of all, her reactions amused him, intrigued him.

"People can change their minds."

Her laughter ceased in the same manner it had begun – in an instant. Sakura perused him intently, flecks of suspicion and calculation in the green of her eyes. Low, serious, her next words stunned him.

"You are amused."

Itachi's throat gurgled with laughter that never spilled forth. This woman…how facile it was for her to read him, to interpret his moods. There was nothing left to say but another truth.

"And you're intrigued."

Sakura mimicked his example, didn't bother with excuses or refusals. Her head cocked to the side as she gave him a silent nod.

"Is it because I remind you of Sasuke?"

A slow grin spread across her lips, half-mock, half-delight, and Itachi could tell that she derived pleasure from his question.

"Yes and no."

Three bland words. Nothing more, nothing less. Even if Itachi waited for her to explain – _yes, you are attractive, like him; no, you are guileful, unlike him _- he knew she wouldn't. It only made this more entertaining. Hence, he took her bait, replied in kind.

"Do elaborate. Tsukuyomi won't end for another ten hours. Unless you would like to experience what my brother or Kakashi-san did for the remainder of the time. It's all the same to me."

_Liar. _It was delivered with the swiftness of a snakebite. Sakura might not have vocalized it, yet Itachi nonetheless heard the word as it slithered within the pathways of his mind. What she spoke aloud was wholly different, slathered with toxic sweetness.

"And if I did?"

Again, Itachi felt the intrinsic urge to laugh.

"You'd choose torture over conversation?"

Lips pursed, she appeared to be mulling over his question for a few seconds, shrugged when she reached an answer.

"It depends on the conversation and with whom I'm having it."

If only for her ingenuity, her sharp tongue, and enduring his Tsukuyomi for nearly sixty hours through past horrors, Itachi acknowledged her. The severe mental stress she had suffered might have culminated into a fusion of lucidity and insanity in her mind, yet she was not without wits. Itachi reasoned a dormant personality lay inside her, now awakened, brought to the surface to shield her from the worst of it. If nothing else, Sakura was…_unique_.

Rows of bonds unraveled, grazed against the delicate skin of her ankles and wrists as they came undone. Standing on her feet, surprise mixed with heat in her eyes, Sakura only gave a hiss as she rubbed her abused flesh.

"What would you like to do then, _Sakura_?"

Her eyes flashed with shock and something else, wilder, for the barest moment. Whether at hearing her name for the first time or at the explicitness of his suggestion, Itachi wasn't certain, but when her lips split wide, bearing rows of white, perfect teeth, he knew two things. Sakura was more amused than ever – and _she wanted him_.

"You're giving me a choice? I guess I'm not the only one intrigued."

"You'd do well to recall my warning regarding assumptions."

The curve of her mouth did not straighten in the least, a mockery of a grin. If possible, it stretched more, lines of baneful joy creasing the smoothness of her cheeks. She could tell his warning was spoken for the mere sake of it.

"Why don't we stop this insipid game? Tell me, what would _you _like to do?"

It was more of a provocation and less of a question. Inviting. Promiscuous. Despite her proposal, Sakura had issued another game with her words, precarious, illicit. Itachi didn't give her the satisfaction of participating though. Ousting her feminine wiles was more diverting – at least for him.

"What do you hope to gain by provoking me? Surely not to…understand me."

He intoned the last words, lacquered them with a veneer of taunt. Her tongue darted out, jet black, slithery flesh, dragged across her upper lip, and Sakura smirked, as if she knew something he didn't.

"No. I've already figured that out."

The way she uttered this, soft-spoken, teasing, how her tongue glistened as she licked her lips, told him he wouldn't appreciate what went on in that clever, little mind of hers. Still, he kept quiet, prodded her to enlighten him – and Sakura wasted no time in doing exactly that.

"I can tell you're not one for senseless murder. I don't know the motives behind the Uchiha massacre, but the reasoning I saw you giving to Sasuke-kun seems…inadequate. There's something else, something…insidious – and I _will _find out what it was that prompted your actions that night."

It was useless to deny her words, keep up the pretense. Sakura had delved too deep, beneath layers and layers of fabrication, unlike anyone else before. Showing her things had tilted the scales in her favor, backfired on him, splendidly so.

"Suppose you do make the discovery, what will you do with that knowledge?"

Itachi watched as she sidled up to him, fearless, provocative, lips slanted, a quarter of a smirk, a pound of temptation, until she stood in his shadow.

"Depends on what it is."

She was enjoying this, dragging out the moment, wishing to make an impact – but so was he. Itachi regarded her closely, inhaled the cloying fragrance of her ravishment – and gave what she wanted.

"You are more dangerous than others give you credit for."

Closer and closer she came, tempted him with proximity and skin. Round and round and round, she circled him, with feather-like touches – on the muscles of his arms, his back, his chest. Fingertips smoothed, blunt nails grazed over his buttocks, raked the jut of his hipbone. Sakura stopped to stand at his side, pressed her breasts against his ribcage, her hand gliding lower, her grasp firm, not light now.

"Will you kill me _now_?"

A swift squeeze, a stroke of heat, hard as the flesh beneath it, and her fingers curled until he made a low, strained sound. She released him with a hard laugh, too. Sakura watched with satisfaction as he swallowed back that sound, as it throbbed inside his body, from his throat down to his erection. The illusion of rapture ghosted over her skin, the promise of taste grazed her lips. Itachi leaned into her, lapped at the underside of her neck, tongue dragging, tasting the delirium in her pulse – one heavy, sumptuous lick. It titillated her nerve endings, halting as it reached her lower lip, the tip of his tongue flattening the plump flesh.

"That's not what you want, Sakura."

It wasn't a question. The moan of her lips, the wetness of her tongue, as she kissed him, swallowed his lust, was answer enough. Nails grazed, fingers trailed along her thigh, from her knee to her hip, dipped low, inside layers of fabric, touched slick want. Clothing faded away, dissolved into nothing, only the strokes of his hand remained, digits embedded deep within flushed lips, movements too languish. They denied pleasure as much as they gave, slow their torture – and still he kissed her.

A huff spilled into his mouth, feminine and petulant, but warm, perspiring, as her teeth sank into the flat of his tongue, half-pain, half-pleasure. Her action received a growl, donned in animal hide, and Itachi pressed her back, against the wooden cross, removed his hand to clasp her hips, her buttocks. Her thighs parted, bent around him, ankles locking, digging into the back of his knees. One smooth thrust, all that it took, all that she needed, and he plunged inside of her, dewiness and hardness, flesh scraping, tongues tangled.

Nerves thrummed, drums of sensations, of taking and being taken. Muscles strained and clenched, hips thrust and twisted. Inwards and upwards. Deep and low. Slick flesh around the length of his erection and turgid peaks between the bluntness of his teeth. Salt gathered in dips of flesh, in the hollow of her neck, the swell on her breasts, slathered on his tongue, trickled down his throat. Sultriness smeared on his thighs, liquid heat dripped from her folds, devoured him. Itachi pounced on her hard, fast, like an animal, took her as he had never taken a woman before, as he never again would. And she did the same.

Delicious friction, electrified, limbs looped around each other, made malleable by lust-kindled moisture and heat. No more words were uttered, none exchanged, his voice reduced to mere grunts, animalistic sounds, hers to screams, unshackled, unabated. Over and over. Time ripped into fleshly pieces, singular moments of pleasure-pain. Intense. Primal. The sound of skin slapping against skin as he rammed against her. The taste of herself on his digits as he slipped them past her lips. Sakura could perceive nothing but sensations after that – wetness and sultriness and roughness. Such potency in his touch, in his unbridled passion. It erased all senses, birthed them anew, sharper than ever before. When Itachi spoke, the throaty aggression in his voice, full of satiation and lust, nearly brought her over once more.

"It is time."

Sakura tilted her neck, attempted to make sense of his words. Covered in sweat, pale locks matted on her face, she tried to catch a glimpse of his features, but her knees gave way, her back rubbed raw. His arm snaked around her waist, kept her upright, pressed flushed against him – a cage of desire. The huskiness of a chuckle touched the accentuated lines of her collarbones, the softness of her breasts, as he laved her skin one last time, answered her unspoken question.

_It is time…to forget._

* * *

"-kura, Sakura!"

Sakura loathed the insistent hands, pushing and pulling and pressing, shaking her out of – what? She couldn't recall what she had been thinking, only that it was intense, full of things a woman should _not_ be thinking whilst on the battlefield. The wetness in the seam of her thighs gave her an inkling of what she had fantasized about but nothing besides that. Sakura blinked once, cursed herself for whatever mind-fuck she had just experienced.

"Chiyo-obaasan?"

"Did he trap you in a genjutsu, girl?"

The Suna elder's words were sharp, the intrusion of her chakra in Sakura's system sharper still.

"I…can't remember."

It wasn't a lie but not the truth either. Chiyo stared at her with curiosity, as if she wished to say something, but changed her mind when Naruto charged forward with a Rasengan into…nothing.

Numb, disoriented, and slightly ashamed, Sakura rushed with Chiyo to help Naruto, wondering what the hell she had just daydreamed about – and, more importantly, _of whom_.


End file.
